The only real selling point is that things might improve with HoT. Otherwise what you have heard is all correct. And we cant really tell you what to do. You sound like the type of person that would get fed up with necro because of its shortcomings even if we somehow managed to persuade you to play it.
For a safe pick play ele. Then roll a necro when HoT comes out if its improved.
@Witcher
Would barely make a difference. Ferocity is less benefical than power and precision. Ranger and warrior have other things in addition to those.
When people were selling precursors in LFG. One of the devs made some clarifications. They said selling home instance was fine because its the formation of a group to do so. Its no different to dungeon selling.
So either they changed their policy or Gaile has a slightly different interpretation. Although i would say the no advertising portal access is rather contradictory to the group formation comment. Which is why I would still stand by and say home instance selling is ok.
Using the LFG for any type of group such as selling home instance access or dungeons is allowed. Using the lfg to sell items is not allowed. Because thats not finding a group.
The thread developed into a discussion about teaching players. And we were giving other alternatives unrelated to the OP. I have no idea why you are argueing against us like we are supporting the OP….
You are missing the point completely. The idea is to give them that knowledge even if they never have to use it for their regular routine. But they still have it. So they understand the game and what other players are talking about. And they are better prepared if they expand their gameplay. You dont have to drill it into people. You just need to give a basic nudge at the start. People that care will remember it. Some wont and it wont matter to them. But more people will be better educated and people wont have the excuse of the game didnt teach me this.
A good game informs you about everything in it without the need to go to excessive third party sources. GW2 fails in that department in both their combat system and their story telling/lore.
ps. I dont believe there is anything in game which lists all the effects finishers have on each type of field. You have to test them out yourself or go the wiki. Dont you think thats pretty ridiculous?
That definitely is terrible lol. I do fractals for fun aswell. But i also need gold for various things and with my limited play time its just not an option to earn 4g in 30 mins. When in that same time i can earn about triple that if i did something else.
Even if you personally dont need good rewards thats no reason to say they are fine. Wouldnt you rather be rewarded more appropriately in addition to having fun?
PS. Ive counted the amount ive earned in frac 50. Its about 3-4g total. Looks like its about the same for you based on your numbers. How anyone can justify that i dont know.
And i would say the average time for a fractal 50 for a decent group is about 30 minutes. And even thats a quite generous on the speed. Using the times only a very small minority pulls off isnt exactly good justification for rewards. If you can complete something faster than whats intended then good for you, you can make more gold per hour than the average player. Which is fair. Dont know why you would want to be barely rewarded for completing at above average speeds and under rewarded for completing at regular speeds. It doesnt make sense for any type of player.
Thats a really lazy and ineffective method of teaching though. They need actual interactive tutorials. They would probably have to be class specific tutorials or use environmental weapons to demonstrate combos.
Not disagreeing but they have at least started putting the info in. When I started I had no idea what a combo field was until I found the wiki and looked it up.
How would you feel about a heart like the training heart in Queensdale where you learn to block (if you take the shield that is)? Just do ones for different mechanics or something.
I already suggested that. I guess you missed my edit.
Thats a really lazy and ineffective method of teaching though. They need actual interactive tutorials. They would probably have to be class specific tutorials or use environmental weapons to demonstrate combos.
Its as simple as create a heart/event/instance which asks you to use environmental weapons to do various combos for progress. Kind of like the train with militia heart in queensdale.
Im almost completely certain it will be assassins or berserker. But im still recommending people save up mats and wait. Would be pretty annoying to craft berserker and find out assassins is considerably better for Rev. It also saves you if the meta somehow becomes other very unlikely options.
You guys seem to be stuck on the word master. I think what Jerus means is it should encourage players to improve and work for a higher level. But it is by no means required for them to master it, just encouraged. They should have the tools and teaching in place for that to not be a completely out of the way venture.
And i agree. I think its ridiculous that they dont properly teach players about combo fields, finishers, CC/defiance, conditions, boons and the various types of active defence. These are basic and integral parts of their combat system. They should be taught to the players. And its not unreasonable to expect very casual open world players to have atleast a basic understanding of how these work.
I think this is one of the biggest mistakes anet has made. They have overlooked it since release and the game suffers immensely from it. Its probably too late to completely solve (too many vet players that are completely ignorant and will skip any tutorials added at this point). But if there is better incentive and teaching in HoT they we can atleast see some improvements.
You dont get that much loot in fractals. And i still dont believe the fractal atmosphere will change if gold reward is increased. Thats a result of easy and overdone old dungeons in addition to good guaranteed rewards. Fractals need some good guaranteed rewards just to make them worth doing. Since they are not completely faceroll and actually requires some time and effort to complete..
Making a fractal 50 give 5g at the end would still seem too low for me. But its a pretty big improvement and still less gold per hour than dungeons. Theres plenty of room for increase before we even get close to the territory of turning it into a gold farm.
Seen it plenty on Alphard and i dont believe its anything new. I always assumed it was something to do with the condi duration reduction. Maybe also has CC duration reduction.
Im against this to be honest. Dungeons were designed for groups. I dont think they should scale ever. Obviously i dislike player count checks just as much as anyone. Those are the only things i would ask to scale. But having a dedicated solo mode. No thanks.
However. Scaling rewards to players would be nice. Say a dungeon rewards 1g on completion for each player. If you solo you should get 5g. So basically it splits the gold pool at the end between the players. A duo would give 2.5g each.
Its very unlikely unless they buff condition damage. The stack limit removal is just a QoL fix to make condition builds not completely useless in open world.
But i really doubt they will buff condition damage because it will break PvP. And i dont think they will create a split that big between PvE and PvP. I would be pleasantly surprised if they did. Although i still think having mostly direct damage should be better in most cases in group content (just not to the same extent it is now).
The thing i always hate about sub fee games is they make you feel like you need to log in to get your moneys worth for the rest of the month. If i dont feel like playing for a few days im getting less gametime for my money. With GW2 i dont have that pressure.
And funnily enough ive probably paid the equivalent of being subbed since release for gems. But ive never felt forced to log in and didnt feel like i was missing out when i took a few months break. Im also really glad there is no system like in ArcheAge where you pay sub for bonus benefits. Those perks arent necessary but they sure as hell feel like they are.
Nope its not possible. I tried a few weeks back. Tried using minions. Well cooldown reduction and rotating them. Even tried mixing wells with minions. But you just dont have enough damage. Even tried siphoning and other random things. I also tried using staff marks to save wells on the first burrow. It kind of half worked (not actually sure if they damaged the burrow though). I still needed atleast one well to even get a chance to kill it before the elite scavenger spawned. And then you get stuck in combat from other mobs so you cant use the staff mark trick for any subsequent burrows.
You need to use both wells to destroy the burrow before a silver mob spawns. And then you are completely screwed for the next one. I managed to get about half way done. But the mobs gradually built up and i had no way to deal with them and keep the burrows in check on time.
It would be easy if our aoe skills worked like eles and hit multiple times instead of just pulsing.
Its a two in one deal. You do the daily 21-30 and you get a free daily fractal at the same time. If you dont want to do any daily involving fractals when its on double then dont. Its only 10 AP for christ sake.
Condition builds in GW2 are either very simple rotations or ranged. Sometimes both. This makes them easier for PvE. Either because the danger you are in is less or because the rotation is simple so its easier to focus on active defence.
The most complex condi rotation ive found is signet mastery necro, You have to swap weapons and use signets to maintain might, use scepter skills and time DS 2 and 5. And remember to fire off one life blast for dhuumfire. It gets even worse if you have to use scepter 3 to maintain lifeforce for defence. Its a total headache to do this consistantly in something like a lupi solo. But in a group you can be ranged and you have less real danger. So it can be considered easier and deserving of less damage.
Anyway necro condi damage is one of the lowest in dps and its also the most complex. I wouldnt trust anet on balancing condi damage that well if i were you. All the other class condi builds are pretty simple rotations (mostly auto attacking).
The issue is the other skills worth and the fact that they have stupid cast times. The damage/utility of the 2-5 skills would not be so bad if they had shorter cast times and aftercasts.
Elementalist. If you managed to learn engi then you shouldnt have much issue learning ele. Its highly rewarding and will never fall out of popularity in any gametype. And thats all thanks to being a very well designed class.
Necros are underwhelming. People seem to recommend them for open world. Im guessing the reason is because they have high base durability which makes them pretty faceroll in open world. But in terms of effectiveness ele is still far superior in all areas of PvE. You just have to pay a bit more attention. And for difficult encounters where active defence is needed ele will be the clear winner in dealing with the situation. Mesmer is even easier to survive those encounters on but it has pretty poor solo damage so i wouldnt recommend it for what you are looking for.
Deathly claws hits once every 1.1 seconds. Its not as reliable to hit as it seems. It can be countered heavily by reflects. Its on a 180 second elite cooldown which causes the necro to lose all defence.
Whereas those burst skills are free skills that can be cast for mucher high burst than a single deathly claw. And they can be used frequently. Besides your class has an abundance of other tools. Its not forced into a glass nuker like the necro is.
I would say fractal skins would have more prestige if gained through 500 pristine relics. Thats certainly more dedication than getting lucky on your first few fractal runs. :>
Im talking about guides, sites such as dulfy and the wiki. Gameplay videos are useful to some casual players. But not to the same extent. All the info on the wiki, guides, fansites and official forums is mostly compiled by hardcore and dedicated players. Without them there would be no public info about the game other than what the developers themselves release and whats in game.
Yes there are many players that dont know about all these outlets. But when they ask in game they often get directed to sites like the wiki, dulfy and gw2dungeons.net. Its much more useful to the community to have the info out there and you need dedicated players to create these outlets.
We lack finishers and useful fields to take advantage of the combo finisher/field system. Which is an integral part of group interaction in all gametypes. We lack useful and meaningful utility such as projectile defence and group buffing (hugely important in PvE). We lack unique types of utility like portal and stealth. And have no unique group buffs such as warrior banners, ranger spirits, empower allies, strength in numbers and spotter.
Its easier to explain when you look at what other classes have. Necro definitely has some stuff. But most of it is pretty mediocre and often less accessible and in less abundance than on other classes.
If you are on EU you will probably get kicked from fractal and dungeon groups. The class is bad for PvE and even casual groups on EU are quite restrictive and fussy.
Ive heard on NA you should still be able to find groups that will accept you. But the class is still unpopular due to its issues.
We are all kind of waiting for HoT to improve the class in PvE. Over 2 years of being a selfish and undesirable class in PvE is pretty frustrating.
Its pretty much guaranteed to be glass direct damage. But at the same time it could be assassins. So either way you are probably best waiting and just saving up the mats and components for crafting.
Even with improved conditions in HoT. Direct still has far superior maximum potential and benefits more from group buffs. One thing can be certain though. Theres no way Celestial will ever be meta for any class in PvE. The very concept of cele is to provide a balance of everything with no maximum efficiency in any area. You will have wasted stats no matter how well a class can take advantage of most of them.
Thats only your opinion of it. You cant speak for every casual player.
Besides i wouldnt even consider you a casual player. You are obviously quite invested in the game even if you have low play hours. So you hardly have the right to speak for casual players. I play even less than your example but i wouldnt consider myself a casual player.
Hardcore players might not be marketing to casual players. But they are certainly a big influence on keeping a game alive. All those player resources that casual players rely on and use are not created by casual players.
My mistake on cooldowns. For some reason i had the idea that glyph was 45 seconds which is kind of weird since i play ele almost exclusively. x)
Cast time is kind of irrelevant when considering a defensive cooldown of this type. I would happily take a longer cast time if it was on the same level as sandstorm.
30 second cooldown sounds good. I would also say buff the duration a bit. It needs to be much better than black powder seeing as its a utility skill. And it should be comparable to sandstorm.
WoD is better than black powder for burst trash mob clearing. Assuming the duration is enough. Black powders small radius makes it pretty weak. Especially since they nerfed its pulses. However even though black powder isnt perfect. Its good enough. And its spammable to a certain degree. But for more spread out groups its not very effective. A sandstorm or WoD is far more effective for though groups.
What you should be comparing WoD to is glyph of storms sandstorm. Glyph of storms has almost twice the duration, has more pulses, does damage and has additional types of AOE depending on attunement. So yeah looking at it like that WoD could definitely do with a buff. Buffed duration and pulses would be the minimum i would ask for.
He spams an attack that does a lot of damage in a 600 radius and launches you back. The green things constantly knock you over and poison you, meaning it can be difficult to position yourself safely. If you dodge you may end up in the path of one of them and get caught in a bad place. And the trees will spam immobalise on you which will prevent you from dodging and can also further troll you by keeping you in the paths of the green things. To do it effectively you really want someone spamming blocks or constantly interrupting him so you can keep the group out of the green balls paths without issue.
Got to remember with the new borderlands map coming im suspecting mesmer to be pretty amazing for that. People will be in small groups. So portal travel up vertical cliffs and so on could be pretty common place.
Anyway ive always felt that WvW balance should be mostly just ignored in its current state. There are so many aspects of it so theres a place for every class. You cant really balance zerg vs zerg. And roaming is very similar to sPvP. That means balance should be based on PvE and sPvP. Unfortunately as you said its too focused on sPvP. But even there necro has serious problems which it cant deal with by clever builds. It has to rely on teammates and other classes. Which is really disappointing.
And the problems necro suffers from in sPvP are also issues in PvE. The lack of sustain and active defence is important in both gametypes. Especially when you consider active defence can also include things like area projectile defence. And the lack of disengage is an issue that can be associated with mobility. i dont expect that to be changed in a way that benefits PvE though.
